This article is divided in
two parts. Each is the length of one email. It may be
copied and distributed as long as it is not altered. JI

Upside-down Journalism: how the NY
Times misreported a bombing

Originally
published as:The Emperors
Clothes by Jared Israel

The Emperors Clothes
examines the crisis-points of US foreign policy,
analyzing how they are covered by the media, especially
the N.Y. Times.
It raises strong criticisms, both of the governments
policies and the press. It shows how the media can
distort the news to create support for government policy.

In this first issue we focus on the recent U.S.
missile attack on a Sudanese factory, looking for five
techniques of distortion:

* Self-Evidence

* Bias by position

* Labels

* Suggestions

* Omissions

As you read, keep in mind that we are
creatures of language; words change our moods in an
instant, make us love and hate. And were devoted to
stories, inclined to suspend disbelief, to trust the
writer, accept his world. If a supposedly objective news
story does not shout its bias - or if we have unknowingly
accepted its bias as true - we tend to believe it.

Did the Times
use techniques of misinformation in its coverage of the
Sudan bombing?

Technique #1: Self-Evidence.
News articles often treat the
governments foreign policy arguments as if they
werent arguments at all but established facts. We
call this Self-Evidence,
as in "we hold these truths to be self -evident."

On August 20th the Navy launched 75 Cruise
missiles, blowing up what President Clinton described as:

Our forces also attacked a factory in
Sudan associated with the bin Laden [terrorist]
network. The [Shifa] factory was involved in the
production of materials for chemical weapons.(ibid.)

The Times devoted
hundreds of lines to reports from Administration
officials and Republicans as well as various unnamed
sources backing the President. Heres one example:

"Bin Laden has made financial
contributions to the Sudanese military-industrial
complex," a senior American intelligence
official said today, "of which, we believe, the
Shifa pharmaceutical facility is part." (NY
Times, 8/21, p.11)

So. This was the official U.S. justification.
But what about the Times?
How did it handle the story? How should
it have handled the story?

What If the U.S.
Were the Victim?

What if Sudan had launched 75 Cruise missiles
against the U.S.? What would we expect of a Sudanese
newspaper?

We might say:

It should present the Sudanese attack on
the U.S. in an unbiased fashion so readers could
make up their ownminds;

It should analyze Sudanese government
justifications, asking: "are they logical?"
and "are they based on fact?"

It should report casualties on
page one;

It should prominently
display counter-arguments, not only from the U.S.
government, which everyone would expect to oppose
the attacks, but from domestic critics as well.

Everybody skims newspapers. Studies show that
headlines are often the only thing people read. Thats
why they're so important.

So whats wrong with this headline?

It assumes
a whole lot.

It assumes a
world-wide terrorist network existsand
the Sudanese factory is part of it. Indeed, it assumes
the validity of the whole U.S. government position. It
holds US arguments to be Self-evident.
But isn't the validity of U.S. government evidence
precisely what's at issue? Isn't the Times'
job to present a balanced view and
investigate the claims of those in power so that readers
who don't have hundreds of trained reporters at their
disposal can draw informed conclusions?

Well return to the headline later.

Let's look at some text from the article
itself. Here's paragraph 3:

With about 74 missiles aimed to explode
simultaneously in unsuspecting countries on two
continents, the operation was the most formidable
American military assault ever against a
private sponsor of terrorism. (NY
Times, 8/21/98,p.1, our emphasis)

In making its point (that this was a big
military assault) the Times
again assumes the truth of the US position (that the
Shifa plant was part of a privately sponsored terrorist
organization.)

In another article, Times
enthusiasm for the governments argument ascends to
poetry:

The twin attacks [on Afghanistan and the
Sudan] provided a certain symmetry to the [Embassy]
bombings in East Africa. Though seas apart, the
targets share a connection to Mr. bin Laden. (ibid., p.A10.
Our emphasis.)

The governments position is stated
casually, as one might assert any universally accepted
fact. Evidence is not required.

What About
Opposing Views?

The August 21st
issue of the Times
is devoted mostly to the missile attack. Do any of these
articles, does even one of these articles, report criticism
of U.S. actions?

Just barely. With hundreds of lines of text
supporting the missile strikes, the Times
lets the opposition speak, in paragraph 20 of a p.13
article called Long Enmity Between U.S.
and Sudan Boils Over.

Ghazi Salaheddin, the [Sudanese]
Information Minister, said the plant had been opened
two years ago and produced nothing but medicines.
"This is a crime," he said. "There is
no justification for this attack." (NY
Times, 8/21, p.A13)

And even this tiny morsel, placed obscurely,
quotes a Sudanese official, a man everyone would expect
to oppose any attack on Sudan whether justified or not.
Moreover, how seriously would readers take any
opinion of this member of a
government which the Times
has just spent an entire newspaper accusing of terrorism?

An August 22 Gallup Poll showed 19% of the
American people opposed the bombing and 16% were unsure.
From one standpoint this is a poor showing for the
opposition: if the poll is accurate, 2/3 of the people
supported Clinton. But look it another way. Consider the
fact that the media never presented the opposing view.
And that nevertheless 35% did not support Clinton.
Imagine how much stronger the opposition would have been
if readers had been presented with both sides.

By the way, the NY Times
never mentioned this poll. In fact, based on an Internetsearch of all U.S. media, the poll
was reported in only one newspaper
- not the Washington Post
or the Boston Globe
or the LA Times
but--- the Fresno Bee.

The Fresno Bee. Guardian
of democracy. Check it out: August 23, 1998.

The word "critic" does appear on P.1
of the August 21st NY Times,
in an article about how Republican leaders don't
oppose the bombing. The headline is:
"Critics Support President's
Action."

In political usage, isn't a "critic"
someone who finds fault with an action? It's true that
Republicans are generally critical of Democratic
presidents, but what had Congressional Republicans said
or done prior to August, 1998 to qualify them as critics
of military adventures? By associating the word "critic"
with support for the attack, the headline creates the
impression that there just isn't anyone opposed. "See,
honey? Even the critics
back it."

A Critical
Critic speaks

A few real domestic critics did make it to the
pages of the NY Times but
not until three days after the bombing, and then only in
the Letters to the Editor section. Here is one such
letter:

No state has the right to exact
retribution through an armed attack on another
country....Nor does any state have the right to
launch missiles against a country it believes to
harbor terrorists President Clintons bald
assertion that the U.S. bombing was justifiable
because the Sudan and Afghanistan have consistently
failed to heed U.S. demands to eject Osama bin Laden
and others is extraordinary...The real victim [of the
missile attacks] was a world in which rules matter
and those responsible for acts of violence are
brought to justice, not simply killed. (James C.
Hathaway, Prof. of International Law, U. of Michigan,
NY Times, 8/23,
p. A14)

Why couldnt the Times
have interviewed one of the many academics and others
opposed to the Sudan bombing and put their views on P.1?
Clearly a decision was made by the people in charge at
the Times not to
present such views.

TheyCould Have Done It Right

If the Times had
opted to do the right thing, it might have run the
following headline:

Clinton
Defends Missile Attack; Critics Charge State Terrorism

This could have been followed by a
presentation of views from both sides. Wouldnt that
have been fair? But wouldnt that have had a very
different effect on public opinion?

Within two days Clinton's justification for
the bombing was under siege.

Millions of people around the world criticized
the missile strikes as lawless violence.

Sudanese who did not
support Osama bin Laden were furious. Listen to
Abdulrahman Abuzayd, an opponent of the Islamic
Fundamentalist Sudanese government:

"As a Sudanese Im mad...O.K.,
we have problems with this regime. But we solve them
ourselves. Now the Americans have come and given it a
big shot in the arm..." (NY
Times, 8/23, p.11)

And concerning Osama bin Laden:

"The Americans have suddenly created
a Muslim hero out of him, whereas last week he was
considered a fanatic nut." (ibid.)

Another well-known opponent
of the government in Sudan spoke out:

A lawyer for the owner of the bombed
pharmaceutical plant said at a news conference that
the factory was solely owned by Salah Idrisee, a
Sudanese businessman The lawyer, Gazi Suliman,
who is well known here as a
member of the political opposition said
it was rubbish that Mr. bin Laden was an
investor in the company. He said that the Sudanese
Government had no financial interest in the plant and
that it had made only human and veterinary drugs,
supplying more than 50 percent of the domestic market.
The Sudanese will now be without a vital supply of
medicines, he said Mr. Suliman called on the
international community to form an investigative
committee to look into what the plant had
manufactured. "We will accept the results,"
he said. (ibid.
Our emphasis)

Trying a New
Explanation

So the government went back to
the drawing board and on 8/25, a front page headline in
the Times
declared:

U.S. Says
Iraq aided Production of Chemical Weapons in Sudan -
Baghdad's Role Cited as Key Reason for Attack

Here are the first three paragraphs of the
article:

The U.S. believes that senior Iraqi
scientists were helping to produce elements of the
nerve agent VX at the factory in the Sudan that the
American cruise missiles destroyed last week,
Administration and intelligence officials said today.
The evidence cited today as justification for the
attack consisted of a soil sample secretly obtained
months ago outside the factory, the Shifa
pharmaceutical Industries, the officials said.
Publicly the Administration has refused to describe
its evidence in any detail, or to say how it was
obtained.

The rare chemical would require two
more steps, one very complex, to be turned into VX,
one of the deadliest nerve agents in existence and
the chemical, whose acronym is Empta has no
industrial uses.

The United Nations and the Unites States
has long agreed that Iraq is extremely skilled at
many kinds of VX production. (NY
Times, 8/25, p.1. Our emphasis)

This article is instructive in several ways:

First, there is still no answer to the charge
that the missile bombings were illegal. The Times
simply ignores this view, probably held by most people in
the world, including millions in the U.S.

Second, other than an unsubstantiated claim
regarding Iraqs "skill" at making VX
nerve gas, the article cites no actual evidence of "Baghdads
role." It simply asserts a U.S. "belief" (without
saying who holds this belief) that Iraqi scientists were
"helping" make nerve gas at the Shifa plant.
This is rumor-mongering, not news.

Third, if "Baghdads role" was
really the reason for the attack why didn't Clinton or
anyone else mention it until five days after the bombing?
And what about the original key reason, the connection
between bin Laden and the Sudanese government? How can
the key reason for an action change after the fact?
("Your Honor, my client doesnt think his
original testimony has convinced the Jury and he would
like to drop it and try another.")

And why doesnt the Times
comment on this attempt to edit the record?

Fourth, once again the Times
simply asserts that
the Shifa plant made chemical weapons. No evidence.

Fifth, the Times presents
the governments claim, that the chemical Empta has
no possible commercial uses, as if it were a proven fact.
(More Self-Evidence.)

Now lets return to the article. Moving
down to paragraph seven, it abruptly shifts from "Baghdads
role" to an entirely different matter: a dispute at
the UN:

The U.S., however, has rebuffed calls from
the Sudan and other countries to turn over its
evidence [that nerve gas was being produced at the
Shifa factory in Sudan]. At the UN, the Security
Council today put off a request by Arab nations,
submitted by Kuwait, one of the closest Arab allies
of the U.S., to send inspectors to search the rubble
in Khartoum for signs of chemicals related to VX.."I
dont see what the purpose of a fact-finding
study would be, Peter Burleigh, the deputy
American representative to the UN said after the
meeting. "We have credible information that
fully justifies the strike we made on that one
facility in Khartoum." (ibid.)

Isnt this rather startling?

First of all, what is this UN report doing in
an article about rumors of Iraqi involvement?

Second, I don't know about you, but I had to
read it twice to make sure it actually says what it says.
Not only is the U. S. government asserting the right to
send missiles wherever it wants if it claims to have
"credible information" of a link to "terrorism"
but it refuses to allow an independent attempt to verify
the truth of the "information" that such a link
exists.

In other words, the U.S. government has
designated itself investigator, prosecutor, judge,
executioner and court of appeals for international
affairs.

Amazing.

As readers proceed through an article they
drop away in droves. So by placing the report on the
conflict at the UN seven paragraphs
down, the Times
editors have guaranteed that it will have a lot fewer
readers than if they had placed it in paragraph one. This
is Bias by Position.

What's the real news story here?

The blather about "Baghdad's role?"

Or the hard fact that the U.S. refuses to
allow the Security Council to inspect the Sudanese
factory?

By Positioning
the Baghdad gossip ahead of the UN story, the Times
achieves two things. It buries the story of US
stonewalling at the UN where few will read it and at the
same time dulls the perception of those who do read it in
a fog of sensational rumor-mongering about Iraq. "Honey
did you hear? Iraqs behind that nerve gas plant!
Our UN guy's saying enough is enough!"

If the UN story had been put first, the
headline might have been different, something like:

U.S. Says No to Inspection
of Bombed Plant

Quite a change from:

U.S. Says
Iraq aided Production of Chemical Weapons in Sudan

Since 8/25 the Times has
published only one
article devoted to the "Baghdad connection."

That single article appeared on 8/26, page 8.

The headline read:

Iraqi Deal
With Sudan on Nerve Gas Reported

Here is the beginning of the article:

At the end of the Persian Gulf war in 1991,
when the Sudan was one of Iraqs few remaining
friends in the world, the Government here struck a
bargain with Baghdad, foreign diplomats and Sudanese
said today. In return for Iraqi financial help and
assistance by military and civilian experts, the
Sudan agreed to allow its installations to be used by
Iraqi technicians for steps in the production of
chemical weapons, they said. (NY
Times, 8/26, p. a8)

The Emperors Clothes finds
this less than convincing. It reports that something
never specified might have happened somewhere
in the Sudan eight years ago, or
thereabouts, but there no evidence and no specific event.
The people who told the Times
about this something-or-other are not named.

The first paragraph, the most-read part of any
news story, makes a non-point: after the Gulf War "the
Sudan was one of Iraqs few remaining friends in the
world." This serves only to lend credibility to the
vague statement: "the [Sudanese] Government here
struck a bargain with Baghdad." As with all rumor-mongering,
it creates an impression without solid evidence.

The actual facts are at the very end of the
article, starting in paragraph 30, and these facts
contradict the earlier stuff:

Iraqs representative at the UN
denied [the charge]. Iraq has had
pharmaceutical contracts with the Government of the
Sudan and I believe that this was the factory that
was producing these medicines...So in that context we
have had commercial ties,"[said the
representative]. [The Times
has seen] Copies of documents from an Iraqi order...of
a compound intended for de-worming farm animals...
approved by the Security Council sanctions committee.
(NY Times, 8/26,
P.A8)

So Iraq had a legitimate, medical connection
to the Shifa factory. A Times
investigator even dug up UN documents by way of evidence.
Since this contradicts the US government's claim,
broadcast a day earlier on P.1, why is it stuck at the
end of an article which begins by endorsing the now-discredited
government position?

If the article had been organized correctly,
with the substantial news in the beginning and the rumors
at the end, the headline might have read:

Iraq ordered
veterinary drugs from bombed plant

Or even:

Contradicting US Claim, Iraq
Had Legitimate Link to Shifa Plant

It is now September 25th. Since August 26th I
have seen no reference to Iraq producing nerve gas in
Sudan. Nor has the Times
retracted the story.

How can our leaders bomb a factory, present a
justification for the bombing, switch to a different
justification and then drop the new justification as
well?

Do U.S. foreign policy arguments resemble
sales promotions, to be tried out and discarded if they
don't "move the product"? And is the Times
an ad agency?

On August 27th more problems surfaced:

The chemical that the U.S. cited to
justify its missile attacks on a Sudanese factory
last week could be used for commercial products, the
international agency overseeing the treaty that bars
chemical weapons said today. The U.S. has insisted
that the chemical found outside the plant could only
mean that the plant was intended to make the nerve
agent VX. (NY Times,
8/27, p.1)

Note that though the Times
does report this news, which is damaging to the U.S.
position, it still accepts as Self-Evident
the governments claim that it
found traces of Empta outside the Sudanese plant. The Times
does not remind readers of the U.S. refusal to allow
independent Security Council investigation of this claim.

In the last paragraph of the same article
theres a bombshell. Thomas Carnaffin, a British
engineer who worked as a technical supervisor during the
Sudanese factorys construction from 1992 to 1996
said he saw no evidence that the factory was used to
produce nerve gas:.

"I suppose I went into every corner
of the plant," he said in an interview from his
home in England. "It was never a plant of high
security. You could walk around anywhere you liked
and no one tried to stop you." (ibid.,
p.8)

By August 28th, the world was in an uproar
over the growing body of evidence that the government had
lied. One Times
article explained that chemical analysts could easily
mistake Roundup, the weed killer, for Empta, the nerve
gas ingredient. Was the government using the Times
to float a cover story in case it had to back down from
its nerve gas story? "Oh, it was weed
killer! So sorry!"

Former technical supervisor Thomas Carnaffin
was quoted again:

The plant "just didnt lend
itself to making chemical weapons," said Tom
Carnaffin, a British mechanical engineer who served
as technical manager at the plant during its
construction from 1992 to 1996. "Workers there
mixed pre-formulated chemicals into medicines,"
he said, "and lacked the space to stockpile or
manufacture other chemicals." (ibid.,
8/28)